


The Tables Turned

by melissashastings



Category: PLL - Fandom, Pretty Little Liars
Genre: Angst, F/F, Ian Thomas - Freeform, Prison, Wren Kingston - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-10
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-11-30 12:13:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11463381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melissashastings/pseuds/melissashastings
Summary: Charlotte Dilaurentis is serving time for torturing the girls of Rosewood. Melissa Hastings is serving time for the murder of Bethany Young. They haven't spoke in years but now when they're forced to be behind bars together, that fact seems to change.





	1. The Tables Turned

11.37pm

The outskirts of Rosewood.

It had rained approximately 12 minutes beforehand.

It was 13 days since her birthday.

She was wearing a pair of dark black jeans and a mid sleeve white blouse.

Melissa remembered every detail when it happened.

She remembered being in the middle of a conversation with her father.

She remembered watching the detective inspector eye up all of those around her.

She remembered her whole world falling apart as soon as they made eye contact.

She could still feel the handcuffs round her wrists.

She could still remember the look on the face of people around her.

She could still hear the woman telling the room how she was the one to kill Bethany Young.

 

 

She stood in the middle of the cafeteria, the tray in her hands full of food that wasn’t easily going to be digested. She’d spoke to her father earlier in the day, he’d said how he was working his best to get her out of there but it wasn’t worth getting her hopes up, she knew she would never be getting out of here soon.

Maybe it was what she deserved but the people in here hadn’t done the crimes they had committed out of love, well some of them say that but it’s probably because they hadn’t been educated further than learning the alphabet.

She hadn’t made any friends yet, she’d spoke to a dark-haired girl about how to use the phone, she’d spoke to a woman about what time lunch was but that was it. It was her second day here and maybe she had wanted to click with somebody by now, be able to have at least one person looking out for her. Well who needed to rush things when she had years ahead of her?

The Hastings sat at the end of a long table that had the remainders of the last meal on it, she placed her tray down as the rest of the people on the table made no attempt at speaking to her. They were all lost in a story one of the others were telling and maybe she was that desperate to fit in she found herself listening into their conversation.

 

“And, well what I’ve heard from Natalie, who heard it from Mandy – well – apparently this psycho makes this full on prison for these girl’s shits called a dollhouse or something. She makes it so that these girls, teenage girls or whatever, they’re at home but they’re being tortured – shit is creepy. She’s out here acting like she’s little Miss Innocent, but we all know what she’s done. She’s fucked up man.”  
“Charlotte?” Melissa didn’t mean to join in the conversation but her mouth was open and the rest of the table were now glancing her way.

 

“What did you say?” She could feel the sick rising in her stomach, the hairs on the back of her neck standing on edge.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude but you’re talking about Charlotte, Dilaurentis. Drake. Whatever. I know her, knew her actually.”

And that had got their attention, maybe her way to get friends around here was to give information about the weird girl whose favourite hobby is to keep teenage girls as her toys.

“No way, she really as crazy as they say she is? She really do all that shit?”

 

“Well actually, my sister was in the said dollhouse. I saw pictures online and videos after it had happened, it was horrible. She had made it look exactly like my little sister’s room, she kept her locked away in there with four other girls. She threw one of them into a hole and didn’t even feed her. Oh, and there was another one, I don’t know how long she had been in there for though, it could have been years.”

 

They all looked to each other and then burst out into a chorus of laughter. It was like seeing a group of human beings bonding over something so tragic, so horrible.

“Oh my god-” A woman with blonde unwashed stated, the food almost dropping out of her mouth. “Here she comes.”

And Melissa’s world came to a stand still, she understood that they had heard about this girl but she thought that maybe she was in another prison, in a high intensity degree of captivity. She didn’t expect her to be in the same room as her.

 

She followed the direction to where all the women were looking, and that’s when she saw her.

 

Charlotte looked nothing like she had ever seen her before, Melissa thought to herself that if she hadn’t been pointed out she may never have known it was the girl that what seemed like decades ago, she was deeply in love with.

She wore no makeup; her face was bare and paler than usual making her look ill. Her hair didn’t fall gently round her shoulders, her lips were faded and chapped. She didn’t fit into her clothes, they were way too big for her which indicated she’d lost a lot of weight since she had been in there but then all of a sudden, their eyes met and the thing that was the most painful for Melissa was there was no longer that sparkle in her eyes.

 

“Yeah, you can tell she’s crazy. You can see it in her eyes. She’s got that weird thing in them like you can see into her soul but she ain’t got one.”

But Melissa didn’t engage in conversation, she just stared. Her eyes weren’t soulless, they were dead. Her eyes that were something of an ocean before, the deep shades of blue swirling into a sea you’d find yourself lost in, now they were dark a reflection of her own being and maybe Melissa was going insane but she swore that when she kept her eyes there for this long period they reflected the colour of black. Her eyes were so still. She was moving but they were not, her face moved, her lip upturned in a forced manner but her eyes just stayed still.

 

Then she looked away.

 

The women around her had moved onto a new topic of conversation and Melissa’s appetite had now disappeared. No longer did she feel anger towards the woman who probably dropped her in this mess, she felt pity.


	2. Jealousy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Well things change, don't they?"  
> "I guess they do."

So, the whole way that this thing worked was that you get dragged from your job to be put into a facility that feels as if you’re trapped inside a glass dome to put you into another job that you’re not suited for, have no experience in and never wanted to ever attempt. That’s how Melissa felt when she began sorting through bags of dirty clothing and placing into large washing machines the sound enough to give anyone a headache.

It seemed as if everyone else had gone upstairs to either go on rotation for new job ventures due to the time that they’d already been there, or they were slacking and decided that because not many people came down here they could just pretend they’d done their scheduled hours of work and go do something else in their now free time.

Melissa on the other hand had decided that she didn’t want to get in any deeper than she already was and anyway, she liked the quiet. She hadn’t ever spent much time as an outsider before, she’d always had things handed to her and now it showed her how much of an advantage that was. Being a Hastings meant so many doors would be open for you but in prison things didn’t seem to run the same way.

Melissa had her arms fully in the machine throwing in a batch of orange overalls into it, the smell of some of them bad enough to make her heave. She let out a loud sigh before calling out, “you can just leave it on that table over there.”

“I never knew you to be one to clean people’s dirty laundry Miss Hastings.” The voice made Melissa jump out of her skin and with that she whacked her head off the top of the machine. She stood back to see Charlotte standing a few feet away from her and she could have been sick with the feeling that ran through her chest.

She ran her hands over one another and crossed her arms before looking at the woman before her, seeing the life in her eyes this time.

“Well, things change, don’t they?” The brunette was lost for words because talking about soiled underwear wasn’t what she wanted to do when she had finally regained contact with her high school sweetheart after so many years.

“I guess they do.” Charlotte nodded, her hands running over the bag of clothes she’d brought down pulling off the table she’d recently placed them on. “I didn’t know you worked down here, and I didn’t know you’d be here now. I’ll come back another time-”

“There’s no needed Charlotte, I’ve washed your clothes many times before. I’m sure I’ll be able to manage.”

Melissa reached her hand out for the bag and Charlotte handed it over to her, the hands accidentally touching for a brief second and a spark went off inside Melissa causing her to drop it straight away.

“Why did you hurt my sister? Was it some sick way to get back at me?”

“I’m not doing this now.”

“All I want is an explanation. After everything we’ve been through, you owe me that.”

“I don’t owe you anything, you made it pretty clear there was no ‘we’ anymore.”

“No, you’re right. You don’t owe me anything but at one point in time you loved me, and I returned that love and I thought that would be something. I thought that would mean that if we’re going to be stuck in here for what seems like an eternity you’d just let my lingering mind be put to an end.”

“You can’t keep playing on the fact that at one point in time you felt something for me, it’s just a way of worming your way back in. Toying with me.”

“Who said I ever stopped?”

\--

It was the fifth day of her time in the facility and Melissa had upgraded from orange to beige, at first it was nice to put an end to sticking out like a sore thumb but it came along with the ideal that she would be wearing this colour for a very long time now. There had been no attachments made, she’d probably say no more than eight words to the person she shared a ‘room’ with, which wasn’t a room but a setup of mattresses on ill-fitting metal bars that were only divided by singular brick walls that you only needed to stand up to be able to see over. It wasn’t like anything she had seen before and people knew that, maybe that’s why they steered clear.

She was exhausted, under her eyes shadowed a dark shade of black, she tried to keep her hair well-kept but nothing could stay the same. At breakfast time, she sat by herself again, the empty table being the only choice for someone who didn’t have the wish to get beaten up for sitting with the wrong people. The Hastings had taken one bite of her piece of toast when a brunette girl sat in front of her.

“I’m sorry um-” Melissa stated but of course had nowhere to go with the sentence.

“This seat occupied? Cause it sure don’t look it.” This time Melissa properly looked up to see a woman in front of her, she was obviously younger than her. Her hair had a natural curl about it, the dark raven shade which completely contrasted to her pale complexion. It painted the picture of what Snow White would have looked like if she came to life, the way her smirk was planted over her painted lips the colour of a dark red shade that was so obviously against the rules. She had an attitude about her, something that Melissa would have gave anything to have.

“No sorry, it’s just-”

“You’re new, I get it. You don’t know what’s happening, you probably pissed yourself a bit when I actually even looked at you but you’ve got it worse because you’ve got a lot of money and never thought you’d end up in a place like this with people like me.”

“I guess you hit the nail on the head.”

“Rhodes. Leone Rhodes. And you are?”

“Melissa Hastings… Why are you doing this? Being nice to me, sitting with me, not trying to beat me up or glare at me from a distance?”

“You’re new, I was like you once. I’ve never really stuck with someone before, never really clicked. Maybe I’m turning over a new leaf and trying to be a better person now, or something along those lines. And you’re hot. It’s a win-win situation for me. It’s nice to meet you Hastings, I’m sure we’ll get along very well.”

\--

The day had passed quicker than normal, maybe because this time she had someone to share it with. Leone was like a character from a novel, the sense of mystery stuck to her and Melissa was completely intrigued. It was getting late and it was time for dinner, if that’s what you wanted to call it. Melissa grabbed her tray and sat down waiting for her new friend to make an appearance. Soon a tray opposite her was placed down but the same maroon painted nails were not holding onto it.

Charlotte.

“That seats taken.” Charlotte’s eyes glanced around at how the rest of the table was empty.

“Is it empty? Or do you just not want to be seen with me?”

Melissa didn’t look at her, she couldn’t. She tried briefly a few days ago and things just felt like a train slowly running off a track, things hadn’t ended well when they’d first headed for different directions so maybe this is why things felt so tense.

Charlotte sat down and started to eat, usually both girls sat alone so a few eyes wandered over to see what was happening especially since the only thing everybody knew about Charlotte was ancient myths. The blonde girl felt a sense of desperation, Melissa is the only person that she could speak to, the only person she had spoken to since she has actually got here. She didn’t just want to get on with Melissa, she needed to if she wanted to maintain any sanity that she had left.

“I know the setting is all off, but I’m glad to see you.” Melissa scoffed at the statement, finally maintaining eye contact with Charlotte.

“Yes, this really is great isn’t it, you and me, in a minimum-security facility.”

“You know that’s not what I mean.”

“I know.”

“You were much sweeter with your words when we weren’t in the public eye and you were holding my dirty clothes.”

“You were much sweeter when you weren’t torturing my sister and hiding the reason behind it from me.”

“You got me.”

And Melissa’s mind had wandered to Charlotte, quite a lot. She had imagined what would have happened if she hadn’t walked out and they had kept their plans. What would have happened if they kept their early morning bedroom wishes of eloping to somewhere where they’d spend the rest of their days, Melissa was onboard for Paris, Charlotte preferred Italy. Melissa remembered those conversations like they were just yesterday.

“I missed you too Charlotte.” Melissa said having to blur out the whole torture of her sister scenario that had taken place. Charlotte’s hand reached out, she placed it gently over Melissa’s, for a while it remained like that until there was another person at the table and Melissa quickly jolted her hand away.

“You making new friends without me?” Leone smirked, sitting next to Melissa at a close proximity. The intense glare at this unfamiliar face indicated that Charlotte was jealous to put it lightly.

“I, Um, Charlotte this is Leone, Leone, Charlotte.”

“Oh you’re Dilaurentis?”

“Correct.”

“I’ve heard a lot about you.”

 

 

“Shame, I’ve heard nothing of you.”


End file.
